Russia
- Amur River: Amur comes from the Tungus amor for "great or big river".
- Arkhangelsk Oblast: the region of the city of Arkhangelsk, whose name the inhabitants traditionally associated with a monastery in the area dedicated to the Archangel Michael (Russian: Архангел Михаил or Arkhangel Mikhail).
- Chechnya: the Russian ethnonym Chechen probably derives from the name of the ancient village of Chechana or Chechen-aul. The village stands on the bank of the Argun River, near Grozny. Another theory derives the name from chechenit' sya, "to talk mincingly". Vasmer suggests a Kabardian origin: šešen. The native term, Noxçi, comes from nexça (sheep cheese), nox (plow) or from the prophet Noah (Nox in Chechen).
- Dagestan: the word Daghestan or Daghistan (Avar: Дагъистан; Arabic and Persian: داغستان) means "country of mountains"; it derives from the Turkic word dağ, meaning "mountain" and the Persian suffix -stan meaning "land of". The spelling Dagestan transliterates the Russian name, which lacks the voiced velar fricative.
- Grozny or Groznyy: Russian for "stern" or "severe" (as the adjective describing a fort)
- Kaliningrad Oblast: from the Russian name Kaliningrad (Kalinin-city) of its largest city, renamed in 1946 to commemnorate Mikhail Kalinin
- Kazan (former Imperial Russian governorate): (compare the name of the city of Kazan)
- Khabarovsk Krai: the Khabarovsk region. The city of Khabarovsk took its name from the explorer Yerofey Khabarov
- Leningrad Oblast: from the city (Saint Petersburg formerly known as Leningrad (Russian for Lenin-city)
- Nizhniy Novgorod: Russian: literally "lower Novgorod": for "lower new city", "new city on the Lower Volga"; in contrast to the older Novgorod
- Novaya Zemlya: Russian for "new land"
- Novgorod: from Russian roots meaning "new city"
- Novosibirsk: roughly means "new Siberian city"
- Sakhalin: derived from misinterpretation of a Manchu name "sahaliyan ula angga hada" (peak of the mouth of the Amur River). "Sahaliyan" means "black" in Manchu and refers to the Amur River (sahaliyan ula).
- Siberia: from a Tatar word meaning "sleeping land"
- Smolensk: from the river Smolnya
- Vladikavkaz: Russian for "ruler of the Caucasus" or "rule the Caucasus"
- Vladivostok: Russian for "ruler of the East" or "rule the East"
- Volgograd: Russian for "city of the Volga" or "Volga city"
Read more about this topic: List Of Etymologies Of Country Subdivision Names
Famous quotes containing the word russia:
“Today’s difference between Russia and the United States is that in Russia everybody takes everybody else for a spy, and in the United States everybody takes everybody else for a criminal.”
—Friedrich Dürrenmatt (1921–1990)
“How can I explain the difference to me between America and Russia?... the America I’ve known is a place where men on horseback escort union marchers, the Russia I’ve known is a place where men on horseback slaughter young Socialists and Jews.”
—Golda Meir (1898–1978)
“... from Russia I didn’t bring out a single happy memory, only sad, tragic ones. The nightmare of pogroms, the brutality of Cossacks charging young Socialists, fear, shrieks of terror ...”
—Golda Meir (1898–1978)